Ryo Minakata needed help getting in and out of his chair in the classroom.
After his 10-hour flight back to Japan following his sophomore season, he could barely get out of his seat when he landed.
In his clinching victory to win an NJCAA national championship in singles in the No. 3 flight, he was taking painkillers just to survive.
After all of that, the 2019 Hawaii Preparatory Academy alum is just happy these days. Sure, there is still some pain. Yes, he hasn’t achieved the level of success he had hoped at the Division I level. And it’s April and still snowing in Boise, Idaho.
But all of that is secondary to what Minakata always wanted to achieve. The Boise State senior is a contributing member to a tennis team competing for a Mountain West Conference championship with a real opportunity to make it to nationals in Division I.
“I really want to make it to nationals,” Minakata said in a phone interview Monday. “I really want to win conference. Just trying to get to that and feel every moment every day and spend time with the team. That’s all I want.”
Minakata, who is originally from Japan, lived in New Zealand before moving to Hawaii to attend HPA, which is an international school that gave Minakata an opportunity to further his education while continuing to play tennis.
He was recruited by a few Division I schools, including Pepperdine, but because he didn’t have the proper credits from his freshman year of high school in New Zealand, he had to go the junior college route.
So he chose one of the best junior college programs in the country.
“Tyler Junior College was amazing, honestly,” Minakata said. “I was kind of bummed before I moved to Texas because junior college doesn’t sound great, right? I always wanted to go to a Division I school, but I couldn’t because of some credits and stuff. It’s No. 1 in junior college and I thought my tennis level would go down, but the players are awesome, the coaches were amazing and it turned out to be the best first two years I could have.”
After placing fifth at the ITA Cup in doubles as a freshman, Minakata was named a National Junior College Athletic Association All-American in both singles and doubles. He won the national title in singles in flight three and in doubles in flight two.
He led Tyler JC to its third NJCAA national team championship in four years, with the only missing year the 2020 season that was wiped out by the pandemic.
He went undefeated in singles at 18-0 and ended the spring ranked 18th nationally in NJCAA Division I. He was also ranked ninth in doubles with partner Alan Magaden.
He did it all while fighting through real pain in his legs. He thought there might be something wrong, but he had no idea the diagnosis he would get only when he returned to his native Japan following the season.
“I was hurting, but I didn’t know how serious until I went back to Japan and saw a sports doctor,” Minakata said. “I had stress fractures in both of my thighs and both knees I had pretty bad tendinitis to deal with. My teammates helped me a lot, but going to classes, I couldn’t really stand up or sit down in chairs. I was taking painkillers during matches. I had no idea how injured I was the whole time.”
He was also having trouble sleeping but was finally able to get some help while in Japan. He was there the summer when he transferred from junior college to Boise State, but he didn’t want to say anything to the Broncos coaching staff.
He was worried he would lose his spot.
“I always wanted to experience Division I tennis in college since I was a junior in high school,” Minakata said. “I didn’t know what to do before I went to Boise. I was so scared to tell them because I thought they could reject me, but I came here and told them about it because I wanted to be honest and everyone here was amazing. They helped me through it every single day.”
Suddenly, Minakata was getting yoga treatments and physical therapy sessions that made a big difference.
He was ready to go for his junior season and went 12-4 during the spring in singles splitting time between the fifth and sixth positions, including a perfect 4-0 mark in MWC play.
This year, he’s 16-14 in singles and 11-10 in doubles. The Broncos are 18-5 overall and just had an 11-match winning streak snapped in a 4-3 loss to New Mexico for their first loss in league play.
“We were doing great and got to 61st in the nation, but I think we dropped since we lost two days ago,” Minakata said. “We’ve been doing great, though. I’m really excited to play at Nevada this week and then our final home match against Utah State on Saturday before we play in our conference tournament.”
Minakata has lived in Japan, New Zealand, Hawaii and Texas. Now he’s in Boise, which he admits isn’t quite the same as the other places. He says it’s impossible to get used to seeing it snow outside when he wakes up and then be warm and sunny in the afternoon.
He also misses the sea.
“It’s so different. There’s no ocean or anything. I would love to be able to go to the ocean right now and swim or surf, but here we don’t have anything like that,” he said. “It’s so different than Hawaii or Japan or New Zealand obviously, but you try to get used to it.
“You wake up and look outside and know you need a jacket and then in the afternoon it’s hot and you’re wondering, ‘Why did I bring this jacket?’”
Ryo Minakata
>> School: Boise State
>> Class: Senior
>> Height: 5 feet, 8 inches
>> High school: Hawaii Prep (2019)
